Let's refine our sense of moral outrage

I was barely coping with defense attorney Mark Geragos' claptrap on the Satanic cult that whisked into Stanislaus County and absconded with Laci Peterson as she walked her dog. Odd that cults would seek out chipper upper-middle-class women in their third trimesters, eh? This cock-and-bull story followed on the heels of the Winona Ryder defense in her Saks shoplifting case. Geragos argued that Ryder thought her assistant would pay. Even a Los Angeles jury spotted the hole in the alibi after hours of deliberation. Ryder had no assistant.

Now comes Michael Jackson, and Geragos emerges again. I await the press conference in which Jackson pledges to spend the rest of his life looking for the real child molester at Neverland, Jackson's ranch of horrors. Perhaps O.J. could join them.

Whoppers that consume. Whoppers that produce acquittals, or hung juries. I could find the strength to continue if some outrage over these troglodytes and their lawyers emerged.

These cases, investigations and trials are but dots in a landscape of degradation. A Pandora's box of evil surrounds us. Kobe Bryant's defense has not yet emerged, but I am betting on sex addiction. In between the underworld's comings and goings is the bizarre. Britney Spears and Christina Aguilera locked lips with Madonna on prime time television. David Letterman had a son out of wedlock. The Catholic priest molestation scandal has left the airways, but the Episcopalians now have a bishop who committed adultery with another man, a tryst that ended his marriage but, apparently, not his moral leadership.

William Bennett was soaked for millions by video poker machines in Jersey and Vegas, and Rush Limbaugh soaked his back pain in illegal prescription drugs. Limbaugh may soon need Geragos for money laundering charges. Abercrombie & Fitch released a charming Christmas catalog featuring half-naked models in what appears to be group sexual activity, either that or an Episcopalian retreat.

Let's recap. In just the past year we have had murdered pregnant wives, testosterone-charged NBAers nailing the hotel help, females smooching on television with force that shook their navel rings, conservative icons gambling and loading up, and the King of Pop, along with a statistically significant number of priests, accused of child molestation.

There's enough here to inspire a Methodist to fire and brimstone. Yet, what do the masses grab their pitchforks and fire up the muskets for? The most outrage amid this country's greatest moral crisis since "Fatal Attraction" arose over the possibility of CBS airing an unflattering portrait of Ronald Reagan. CBS pulled the Reagan miniseries and packed it over to cable with the rest of cable's pitiful original programming.

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